Saturday, June 2, 2012

Jennings Joins Winning Effort

First let’s explain why the Bulls were playing baseball at midnight on Thursday night. Outside their divisions, the teams in the International League play four games at home and four away. If weather rolls in for the last game of the last series, then the teams will have no opportunity for a makeup. That happened to the Bulls last year and they only (only!) played 142 games instead of 144. The teams and the umps will go to great lengths to not let that happen. Hence on Thursday night the teams sat around the park for over two hours hoping to get a game in.

That also explains why I was able to (barely) hear the game as I was driving through a storm on the Raleigh beltline at 11:30. But have to say that I didn’t find the game all that interesting. The Indianapolis Indians have figured out how to beat the Bulls this year and the best news about the trip is that the Bulls don’t play them again.

Just down the road in Louisville, however, we find the one team that the Bulls have been able to defeat this year. Not that the Bulls are alone, the Bats have the worst record in the IL. Too bad, because over the years the contests between the Bulls and the Bats have usually been just terrific to watch and the two teams were routinely among the best in the league.

The Bulls lineup was fleshed out with rehabbing Ray and former Bull Desmond Jennings. He played a few innings in left field and went 1 for 4. Along with Jennings recent returnees Stephen Vogt (RF, 2 for 4) and Chris Gimenez (C, 1 for 4) were also in the lineup and did a good job of supporting Lance Pendleton.

Pendleton has become the Bulls best starting pitcher, by a bunch. In his last three starts, for example, he has gone more than 6 innings each and allowed only one run in each game. His ERA at 2.93 is the best of the Bulls starting pitchers. In his seven starts, the Bulls have gone on to win the game six times. All this from a guy who wasn’t even in the Rays system at the start of the season - - Pendleton came to the Bulls by way of the Sugarland Skeeters just after Bryan Augenstein went on the DL back in early April.

22 days, 5 hours, 3 minutes. That’s how long it took Diane Van Deren to run from Clingman’s Dome to Nag’s head. That was two days faster than the previous record. Blog entries are interesting, particularly the ones from her run through Tropical Storm Beryl.